I don’t know.
There is something about grief or trauma that catapults one into some very introspective moments.
To be honest, I was a pretty deep thinker before all this. Somewhere in my life having a convos about the weather became boring to me. I wanted to know what people thought and why. I wanted to hear all 50 options before making a decision. And I wanted to know why I was on the planet at this time.
Questions are what I live with. Constantly.
I’d ask knowledgeable people. Watched waaaay too many YouTube videos. Laid awake at night. Journaled, prayed, did SWOT analysis.
And it took my sister passing for me to realize that sometimes, His grace is the only answer that you get for the questions.
And yes, His grace really is sufficient, y’all.
Paul wrote about his questions and prayers about a certain situation in his life, and God told him “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.” Paul then declares, “Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me” (2 Cor. 12:9).
I don’t know how to explain it. He just becomes enough.
Being OK with the Questions
I don’t need to know why. I don’t need to know what spectrum of the doctrine on healing is true. I, in my finite mind, am never going to claim to have cracked the code – like some Christians say – on divine healing, answered prayers, finances, or any other questions us humans have.
Steven Curtis Chapman had a song back in the day called “God is God” (It’s crazy the things you remember from your childhood/teenage years). The words are seared in my memory.
God is God and I am not
I can only see a part of the picture He’s painting.
God is God and I am man
So I’ll never understand it all
For only God is God.
God cannot be put into our reasoned boxes. Our 10 steps to blessing. Our 5 keys to divine healing. Our dance or shout or spiritual rituals. We can share our individual experience, but that doesn’t turn it into some sort of system that everyone else has to follow to achieve the same results. God is into the business of having personal relationships.
Content in Him Alone
I recently spoke with a pastor about contentment. He brought up the classic scripture from Philippians 4:11-12:
“I am not saying this because I am in need, for I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want.”
But then he read the very next verse “I can do all this through Him who gives me strength” (v13).
The only way we can get through this life – both the hills and the valleys – is with His grace. The only way we can handle the questions of life and the random conditions that it presents is through being secure in our position in Christ. In His love and grace.
He has to become our everything.
And man, is it tough! We say He is. But, in the U.S. especially, we don’t really know what that means. Until life sucker punches us in the gut.
That’s where I am right now. Realizing that a lifetime of Christianity was tainted, ever so slightly, by the conditions around me.
Maybe I’ll break that down more later as the Holy Spirit gently reveals the hidden places of my heart. I know His word for me is grace so I don’t fear the spotlight.
In the meantime, my friends, meditate on His grace alone being sufficient. Enough. Everything we need in this life. On the mountains and in the valleys. And for all the questions.
